75A - PH - MEDICAL MARIJUANA - PROHIBIT

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1ONews Exposes 'Marijuana Doctors' POSTED: 4:39 pm PDT July 6, 2006, UPDATED: 12:41. pm PDT .tiny 7, 2006 SAN DIEGO -- Doctors Offer Legal Pot Proposition 215 -- the medical marijuana initiative approved by voters ten years ago, has been subverted, abused and misused say law enforcement agencies our I-Team lzas spoker. with. Prop. 2'. 5 is supposed to provide seriously iL1 people access to marijuana to help relieve their pain but a l ONews investigation discovered just about anyone can get pot legally if they want. 10 News became interested. in medical. marijuana after seeing a Iarge number of advertisements for doctors prescribing pot. These pot does' ads appear every week in the San Diego Reader. Discussions with lONews sources both. in and out of law enforcement seemed to confznn a disturbing pattern of increasing sales by the pot docs as well as an increase in the number of distributors for the medical marijuana. This launched atwo-month l ONews investigation into exactly what was going on. We used staff members to go into doctor's office and see how difficult it was to get a referral for pot.. It was very easy. Too easy in fact, say law enforcement sources. it tunled ou.t both federal and local agencies are also looking into the process. Th.e l ONews I-Team. was able to acquire some government surveillance tapes used to document how different doctors would discuss with patients the benefits of marijuana. One shows an undercover officer and a Dr. Robert Stealer, discussing pot. I assure you Tylenol is more of a risk. to you and a hazard than is cannabis," said Dr. Robert Steiner. Steiner was doing one of his "legi.timate and affordable medical marijuana evaluations as advertised in the Reader. "It's open drug dealing with legitimacy," said Deputy District Attorney Dana Greisen. Greisen said doctors are recommending marijuana to just about anyone who can afford a doctor's visit. "It's being recommended for insomnia, depression (and) azixiety," said Greisen. "The law is being abused in a massive scale," said Greisen. The people using the marijuana aren't suffering from cancer, AIDS or other serious illnesses, which Proposition 215 is supposed to address. It was approved. by voters to "ensure that seriously ill Californians have the right to use marijuana for medical purposes." Dr. Steiner claimed no downsides to using marijuana ou the law enforcement video. "We have two convincing studies that cannabis does not cause lung cancer. Cannabis regenerates brain. cells," said Steiner. The undercover agent then asked if he could also get pot for his dog. "He's got arthritis. He whines at night because of the pain," said the undercover agent. "Again, it is perfectly acceptable far pups," said Steiner. Dr. Alfonso Jimenez has a Web site -- Medical Marijuana of San Diego -- where patients can register far his services online. What happened when we sent our testers in? "He was just laid- back and friendly. (He) didn't really seem to worry about if h.e was giving me this for the right reasons or not," said tester number one. He went to Jimenez for back pain he doesn't have. He got his referral and could have purchased pat. legally. lONews never did purchase any marijuana even after the doctor's approval. "There's a line behind zne coining out of the door, said tester number one. DDA Greisen said it's all about the money. "We had a doctor recently {who) testified he gave out about 2,000 recommendations in last year -- that's what he testified. to in court -- at $230 approximately. You do the math -- that's $500,000 in cash," said Greisen. Greisen said most office calls are paid for in cash. 39 75A-48